Fair enough, yet the differences are semantic, not substantive. The issue is, we have a scarcity of resources in this world. And we’re not just talking about oil or beach-front property, we’re talking about ALL THE MONEY.

We can keep playing this game where we try to package it as nicely as possible, and the plutocracy is going to cry “socialism” every time. They’re going to hit that button. I believe one of the things that must happen is that people need to know what it means to “socialize” a resource or a service.

The bigger problem is the belief that it’s OK to for the wealthiest to have more and more without recognizing that by unlimited having we are creating and perpetuating a massive worldwide epidemic of NOT having. Which is killing us, and creating problems as diverse as the 9/11 attacks, the Eqypt and Libyan crises, and more.

By the way, the logical end-game of the rich getting richer that will “probably get corrected” to use Warren Buffet’s words isn’t some sort of clean, neat, nice, magical redistribution. Redistribution without revolution will take dialogue, discipline and restraint, the lack of which have gotten us to where we are now. Without facing the very tough questions, like how much is too much, and how do we get the wealthy to slow down and the aspiring to stop and think, and lacking a leader who can articulate these problems in the face of unpopular reaction, the logical outcomes are not nearly so pretty, sane, or orderly.

I’m concerned we have long passed the crossroads, and it’s going to take something much bigger and more shocking to change our course. Whatever that is, I do believe it will be far more cataclysmic and far less appealing than facing the simple reality that we need to *redistribute* our resources so that the wealthy, who just plain have too much, proactively prevent the vast majority, which has virtually nothing by comparison in terms of resources, from becoming sort of human tsunami.

A tsunami that, while unstoppable as a geological wave, has been predicted by most of the great sociologists of the last two centuries. We can prevent that tsunami from unfurling, but it’s going to take serious, sustained, fundamental change. Starting with the relatively simple idea that redistributing resources isn’t just a good thing, as in not a bad/socialist thing, it is probably the easiest and best way to fix this broken planet before it gets so broken that fixing it isn’t an option.

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